Australian broadcaster insists its leaked re-enactment of the Pistorius shooting was obtained legally but would not say whether it promised to show it only after the trial

By Jonathan Pearlman, Sydney

7:00AM BST 07 Jul 2014

An Australian television station, Channel Seven, has defended its decision to show leaked footage of Oscar Pistorius re-enacting the fatal shooting of his girlfriend, saying the video was obtained legally and only broadcast in Australia.

The weekly current affairs program which featured the footage, Sunday Night, defended the decision to air it and said it had undertaken a "significant investigation" into the trial.

"We would not have run the footage if we thought we had obtained it illegally," said Mark Llewellyn, the program's executive producer, in a statement.

"The material shown on Sunday Night goes to the heart of both the prosecution and defence cases, including the account provided by Oscar Pistorius. The story was run in Australia only and not made available to any other territory."

Oscar Pistorius runs through a room without his prosthetic legs (Seven Network/Sunday Night)

The dramatic footage, aired during one of Australia's prime television ratings slots, showed the South African Olympian stumbling forward awkwardly without his prosthetic legs and holding his arm out in front of him as if he were carrying a gun. The footage suggests that Pistorius may be more mobile without his prosthetic legs than his defence team has claimed during the trial.

A spokesman for Channel Seven would not comment on claims by the athlete's lawyer that it agreed not to show the footage until after the trial. Nor would the broadcaster say how much it paid for the footage.

Wearing Lycra shorts and a Nike singlet, Pistorius is shown in the re-enactment demonstrating how he bashed down the bathroom door before putting the arms of Reeva Steenkamp, his dying girlfriend, around his neck and dragged her from the bathroom before moving her downstairs.

"Reeva, call the police," he shouts. "Get out of my f--king house." Pistorius's girlfriend was played by his sister Aimee and the re-enactment was filmed at his uncle's house where he has been living since the shooting. Prosecutors say Pistorius murdered his girlfriend after an argument but he says he fired the shots in the mistaken belief that there were intruders in the house.

The decision to air the video was slammed as "unlawful" by Brian Webber, a lawyer for Pistorius, who said it was never meant to be broadcast. He confirmed the video was made by The Evidence Room, a US company which puts together graphic re-enactments of crimes.

"We wish to make it very clear that the material that has been aired was obtained illegally and in breach of the non-disclosure agreement with The Evidence Room," he said in a statement.

"For the family, the airing of this footage constitutes a staggering breach of trust and an invasion of the family's privacy."